William Watson poems
William Watson(1858-1935 / England)
England and Her Colonies
- by William Watson 95
SHE stands, a thousand-wintered tree,By countless morns impearled;
Her broad roots coil beneath the sea,
Her branches sweep the world;
Her seeds, by careless winds conveyed,
Clothe the remotest strand
With forests from her scatterings made,
New nations fostered in her shade,
And linking land with land.
O ye by wandering tempest sown
'Neath every alien star,
Forget not whence the breath was blown
That wafted you afar!
For ye are still her ancient seed
On younger soil let fall—
Children of Britain's island-breed,
To whom the Mother in her need
Perchance may one day call.
Changed Voices
- by William Watson 91
Last night the seawind was to meA metaphor of liberty,
And every wave along the beach
A starlit music seemed to be.
To-day the seawind is to me
A fettered soul that would be free,
And dumbly striving after speech
The tides yearn landward painfully.
To-morrow how shall sound for me
The changing voice of wind and sea?
What tidings shall be borne of each?
What rumour of what mystery?